Sheets returns, beats Cubs

Thursday

Aug 30, 2007 at 12:01 AMAug 30, 2007 at 3:34 AM

Milwaukee’s ace is back in place. The Cubs’ ace seems lost in space.

Jeff Vorva

Milwaukee’s ace is back in place.
The Cubs’ ace seems lost in space.
Ben Sheets, who’d been on the shelf for more than a month with a sprained right middle finger, returned Wednesday night and looked as if he hadn’t missed a beat. He limited the Cubs to one run in six innings, improving to 11-4 with a 6-1 victory in front of a Wrigley Field crowd of 40,512.
The Brewers (66-66) moved back into second place in the National League Central and are 1½ games behind the North Siders (67-64). St. Louis fell back to third place but is just two games out after losing to Houston, 7-0.
Meanwhile, the big question surrounding the Cubs is this: What’s going on with “Big Z”?
Carlos Zambrano (14-11) lost his fourth straight start, a span during which he has an 8.25 ERA. He gave up six runs (five earned) on nine hits in 6 1/3 innings.
It’s his worst stretch of losses since he dropped five decisions over eight appearances from July 20-Aug. 30, 2002. It’s the first time in his career he lost four consecutive starts. He’s the man the Cubs sank $91.5 million into for the next five seasons and is someone the North Siders are counting heavily on in this playoff race.
“You know, I’m looking for the guy who won nine in a row earlier in the year,” Cubs manager Lou Piniella said, even though Zambrano’s longest winning streak this year is four straight. “The problem is he’s not pitching like he was when he was on that streak. Obviously, we didn’t get him any run support. But we need for this guy to get back pitching the way he was and win some baseball games.”
The Brewers probably didn’t mind being a part of one of the worst stretches of Zambrano's career.
On April 7, Zambrano ticked off the Brewers when he compared Milwaukee’s batting order with Cincinnati’s.
“I don’t want to say Milwaukee is nothing, but Cincinnati’s offense is better, and you can’t make mistakes,” Zambrano said then.
Wednesday night, he didn’t make any pals among Brewers with a histrionic fist pump when he struck out slugger Prince Fielder in the first inning. Fielder stared at Zambrano as the latter jogged back to the dugout.
Fielder got his revenge in the fourth when he hit a leadoff double and eventually scored the Brewers’ first run to knot the score at 1-1. The Brewers took the lead for good in the fifth, when Gabe Gross doubled home Rickie Weeks.
The Brewers piled on four more runs off Zambrano in the seventh, the key blow being Ryan Braun’s two-run double past diving third baseman Aramis Ramirez. During that play, a wild pitch in the Cubs bullpen rolled into the infield, but the errant pitch didn’t interfere with the play.
Ramirez’s sacrifice fly scored Zambrano with the Cubs’ lone run of the game in the third inning.
Jacque Jones (2-for-3) was the lone Cub with multiple hits. Corey Hart had three hits to lead the Brewers and has four hits and four RBI in the first two games of the series, which is to conclude tonight.
The Cubs did have one noteworthy accomplishment: Relief pitcher Kerry Wood struck out J.J. Hardy in the eighth inning for his 1,306th career strikeout, moving him past Greg Maddux for fourth on the Cubs’ all-time list.
Meanwhile, Cubs right fielder Cliff Floyd is OK after a brush with the wall, which he crashed into in the first inning when he caught Weeks’ fly ball. The former Thornwood standout held his chest in pain for a few seconds. Although trainer Mark O’Neil went out to tend to Floyd, the meeting was brief, and Floyd stayed in the game.
“He banged his head a little, but outside of that, I think he’s OK,” Piniella said.
More Cubs news is at www.dailysouthtown.com/sports.

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